Workers’ Comp Fraud Suspect Ordered to Trial

After viewing tapes of the defendant riding a motorcycle and painting his garage, a judge ordered a Camarillo sales executive to stand trial on charges that he lied about being disabled and illegally collected nearly $7,000 in workers’ compensation benefits.

Alan Griffis, 41, could become the first defendant in Ventura County to take a case of workers’ compensation fraud before a jury.

In January, he became the first county resident ever to be charged with the crime. But two other defendants charged with workers’ comp fraud since then have pleaded guilty.

Griffis’ attorney said his client will not admit to any wrongdoing.

“My client is definitely not going to plead guilty to a crime that he did not commit,” attorney David P. Callahan said after court, adding that Griffis received benefits only after his physician reported his injuries.

“It’s one of your stranger cases,” the attorney said. “It’s a workers’ comp fraud case without a workers’ comp claim filed by my client.”

On Thursday, Superior Court Judge Allan L. Steele ordered Griffis to stand trial on three counts of workers’ comp fraud and one other count of theft after listening to more than five hours of testimony at a preliminary hearing.

Griffis’ doctor told the judge that he felt Griffis had neck, back and shoulder injuries, but now believes Griffis exaggerated their severity during a series of medical examinations.

The judge also viewed investigators’ surveillance tape of Griffis riding the motorcycle, slipping a motorcycle helmet on and off and painting his garage.

Griffis first started seeing doctors for cervical problems in March, 1993, after he injured his cervical disc while helping a fellow employee move a file cabinet down a set of stairs, lawyers on both sides agree.

Callahan said the other worker, who was on the bottom side of the cabinet, slipped on the stairs and that Griffis injured himself while trying to aid his colleague. He said a Magnetic Resonance Imaging test, an X-ray-like test known as an MRI, showed evidence of a serious injury.

But prosecutors say that any injury Griffis suffered healed quickly.

Griffis started receiving benefits after Dr. Alan M. Gross of Oxnard told state officials that the defendant was temporarily and totally disabled, Callahan said.

But Gross testified Thursday that Griffis had misrepresented his injuries during medical examinations in March, April and July of last year.

With cervical injuries, he said, doctors generally have to take the word of clients about their level of discomfort.

As for Griffis, Gross said, “I was entirely convinced that there was a cervical disc (injury). Completely convinced.”

But despite treatment, Griffis’ condition did not seem to improve, Gross testified. Finally, Gross said he recommended that Griffis undergo surgery last July. Griffis, he said, balked at the suggestion.

The month after that visit, investigators with the State Compensation Insurance Fund showed Gross a tape they had taken during six days of shadowing Griffis’ daily activities.

While Gross had advised Griffis not to even hold his hands above his head due to his alleged injuries, Gross said the tape showed Griffis painting, riding the motorcycle and putting on a helmet.

“It leads you to believe that you have been duped,” Gross testified.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Rhonda Schmidt said state investigators became suspicious of Griffis after he stopped making regular visits to his doctor and his physical therapist.

She also said the tape shows Griffis going to work every day while he was supposedly totally disabled and collecting benefits.

She said authorities believed that Griffis did suffer a minor injury while moving the cabinet. But that he “lied to Dr. Gross in terms of the seriousness of his injuries.”